


Alive.

by argenterie



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, Angst and Porn, Cheating, Consensual Infidelity, Emotional Infidelity, Explicit Sexual Content, F/M, Implied/Referenced Cheating, Infidelity, Out of Character, Past Infidelity, Resolved Sexual Tension, Sex, Sexual Content, Sexual Fantasy, Sexual Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-31
Updated: 2014-07-31
Packaged: 2018-02-11 04:05:59
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,605
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2052903
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/argenterie/pseuds/argenterie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Hermione goes to the door. And it's Harry, who's waiting for her.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Alive.

Hermione:

 

\---

 

I am alone, sitting in my living room, reading a novel, but it’s not sinking in. I read the words over and over. But it’s just not happening. Ron has gone to a conference for Aurors, and I am just alone in our house.

Ron and I were married a year ago. I’m finally a Weasley. It’s good. I like this life of mine, it is good. I glance up at the pictures on the mantle, briefly, seeing our wedding pictures, me, and Ron, we are waving at the camera, it’s a little glimpse of our intense joy that day. Our families around us. Ginny. Ron’s brothers. All of us, all of us who survived the war. My parents. The pictures are so soothing, everyone happy, all smiling, all laughing, waving, and always moving, in these wizard pictures. It’s a joy to see it.

But.

Somehow, my mind is distracted. It’s dark outside, I’m looking out the dark windows and it’s actually raining, I didn’t realize it was raining. But it is. 

And suddenly, the door, I hear a knock at the door. My heart freezes.

I set the book down. There are candles burning, I have always liked candles, even though I know they could burn all my books if I were ever careless enough to leave them burning, but, I am never careless. I am the brightest witch of my age. And I am older now, I am together, and I am so happy. 

Right? Happy.

I go to the door, to see who it is. It’s nighttime, Ron’s away, my house totally empty, so I am cautious. The war is over, I know, but… I am always cautious.

Checking the peephole. And before I can even register, I hear his voice through the door:

“Hermione. It’s me.”

It’s Harry.

Harry, outside on my porch, the rain dripping through his hair. I see him through the peephole and rapidly I am opening the door, the door open, so wide. I dream sometimes of this door, of opening this door and walking away from my life, just opening it and marching out, confidently striding away from the house, from the house that Ron and I live in, just walking, walking away, leaving this life behind and starting all over again, somewhere new, somewhere perfect, just walking away. I dream of this door, opening the door, and escaping.

But tonight, I just open the door.

Harry is standing in the rain. His hair all plastered to his face, his eyes dark and hooded, intense. His glasses fogged. His clothes soaked. He’s just standing there, it’s the middle of the night, but here he is, here is Harry, oh, my Harry, here, in the rain, in front of my open door.

He doesn’t say anything at first, he’s just looking at me, and I am frozen to the spot. The memories flood into me. The tent. Oh fuck, the tent, and dancing with him in the tent, that night, and how connected I felt, and how alive I felt, and then, oh god, and then the next night, the night after we danced, how that next night, I couldn’t stop crying, I felt so alone, so hopeless, so desperately fucking sad, and Harry, he came to me, that night. Ron was gone, I was alone, but then I wasn’t alone any more, Harry was there. In this moment, right now, I am seeing him on my porch, it’s dark, just like that night during the war. It’s raining, just like that night in the war. And my heart is flooded, suddenly, and I am thinking of that night in the tent, remembering Harry’s tongue on my fingertips. My teeth on his skin. His hands guiding mine. I hate that I can't remember it better. I hate that my heart aches, and I don't remember what songs the wizard radio was playing, while I kissed his skin, that I can't really remember how it felt when his hands touched my body, that I can't remember if he made any sounds, any sound at all, as he touched me, so gently, but so firmly, that night in the tent, and as my body responded to him, and I can’t remember if he gasped or moaned or spoke, as he slid his hands inside my panties and then, so softly, so gently, as my tears dried on my face, he just started to touch me, he touched my clit, rubbing his hand around and around, ohgod that night in the tent, his face stern and systematic, and then I can’t remember what he said, or if he said anything at all, as I came, and laughed, and came, my legs shaking, my head thrown back, and I can't remember if he looked at me when that explosion happened, and oh, how I hate it, I hate that I can't really remember. Because, that moment was a pivot moment. It was… it was everything.

Tonight, though. Tonight. He’s standing here, in front of me. And I am crushed with memories. That night, in the tent, before Ron came back, and how intense it was, how important for me, and how then Harry and I never spoke of it again. How it was not important enough for him, how I knew inside, that it was not enough for him to choose me. So I chose Ron, and I choose him still, Ron, oh Ron, he’s my life, my life.

And Harry. Tonight, right now, here he is. 

The memory is too strong. I wish it, I wish it so fucking hard, that he would love me. That he would want me that badly. As the music plays, any song really, it doesn’t matter, and every time a song comes on the wizard radio, I am imagining Harry saying those lyrics to me, about me, and that I feel my heart almost breaking from the desire, and that I felt him against me, god I could not stop running my hands over his body and his neck and his hair and on his lips, the tiny bite of his teeth against my thumb, and my shiver courses down my body, I imagine it over and over, and every time it comes to my mind, my body pulses, I remember the flood of oxytocin and the connectedness, our minds and then finally our bodies, and how much I just wanted him to go further that night, how I wanted him to be inside me, but that after I came, he just sat up, and everything was different. Afterward. He just … he stopped, after he made me come. He stopped. He stood up, tidied the tent, folding things, he looked at me with his eyes all dark, and then he just walked away from me, he did not stay. He didn’t stay, that night in the tent, after I came. He just left me all alone, and I just sat with my own thoughts, and I kept thinking, that night, how I was so glad, and so confused, and so fucking goddamn glad that it all happened, but also, god, fuck, wanting more than that, and what the fuck, isn't that just disastrous, that suddenly I had nearly everything I wanted, for one perfect night, in the tent, and I can't even remember it well enough, and even at the end, I ruined it, and I wanted more, and everything just got all fucked up, and I was doing okay until this, and it’s unbelievable that he even did this for me, but I never thought I would be close to him in this way, so I am shocked. But also, I am alive. Alive. I am fucking alive. That night in the tent, and forever after that night. It's slowed down since then, but after he made me come, that night, and after he stood up, I felt my own feelings wash over me like a horrific tidal wave, so happy and so awfully sad, and so glad, and so angry, and I couldn't stop myself from feeling any of it, and of course, my alcohol level too high, and my emotions all fucked up from orgasming in front of my best friend. Because of my best friend. And he just stood up, and walked away from me, that night. How that felt: like my heart would crack in two.

That night, I thought I couldn’t stand it, but then, I did. I survived it. Remembering his fingers on me, his eyes gazing into mine the whole time, my body betraying me with its reaction, my skin jumping, my muscles all alive, hips twisting up again and again, into his hands, into him, and then when I came, it felt like I was dying, dying maybe, but I needed it so much, I needed it. 

And afterward when he just stood up and walked away, how that felt, that ache, just deep inside me, and how I had felt so alive only moments before, but how right after, I felt like I was not alive again, I was just numb and sad and horrified, and as he walked away, I watched him go, he walked outside of the tent into the rain again, and his hair plastered all down on his head, his glasses blurred, and he turned back to look at me, sitting in the tent, my hair all crazy after he made me come (he made me COME), and he looked at me, his eyes clearly seeing me, seeing me for the first time, maybe. But then, he broke the gaze, and he turned around, and walked away, into the rain. And I felt my heart just ache, pulse, drop. My chest, crushed, feeling so much love and so much sadness at the same time. 

We didn’t speak to one another again until after he and Ron came back to the tent, the next day, and when Ron came back, he rushed to me, he spoke softly in my ear, touching my body, and what was I supposed to do? I touched him back. I spoke back. I held Ron in my arms, tightly, and looked at Harry over Ron’s shoulder. And that is the moment where I realized that Harry and I would both keep this secret, that we would never tell Ron what happened in the tent that night before, that it would be unspoken forever, even between the two of us, and I nodded at Harry, and he nodded back to me. And I held Ron, in my arms.

All of this, aching to remember it, as I see Harry in the rain, outside my house, so many years later, so many life changes later. He is just silent, standing there. He looks into my eyes. He always did: his eye contact was always so passionate, so deep, so penetrating, and I never could really match his gaze, because I would start to feel the twist inside me, the pulse of lust, if I looked at him too long. 

And here he is. Standing there. Not talking.

I realize I have been just standing there too, just looking at him, flooded with memory. I am reveling in this time, that it's just mine for now, that nobody else knows, and this is my own private moment where it's just me that knows it, and how much I loved it, how I felt alive, how it all aches to remember, but how alive I felt that night, how beautiful it was, how intimate. 

I say, “Harry.” 

He doesn’t speak. He just walks forward, the rain dripping down his face, his clothes soaked. He just walks forward into the glow of the porch-light, walks right toward me, and suddenly, his arms are around me, his hands on my back, he’s clasping me so close, I feel his wet, cold clothing against my body, but also, through the robes, I feel his warmth burning through, pressing into my skin, and now it’s suddenly all tangled up like oh no, oh god the god, the shiver moment, the explosion, and he heard me laughing, I wonder if he remembers it, and I know he was touching me that night because he knew how sad I was, that he somehow knew how it would make me feel better, but I always wondered, afterward, if while he touched me, if he was thinking of me at all, if he was imagining I was someone else, he was just touching me because I was there, but really, he was far away from me, with another woman. I always wondered that, and I always hated that I cared so much.

I am swamped with feelings, I feel myself sinking, I am losing traction here. His arms are still around me. I push my head into his chest and hold him, hold him tightly. I still feel my thoughts dancing, echoing, I want to ask him why he’s here, why he chose to come here when Ron’s away, why he would hold me to his body this way, tonight, when he hasn’t touched me in months, in maybe years, why he’s here tonight, holding my body this way, this intimate way.

I am holding him. I feel his chest against my breasts. I feel him pressing his whole body into mine. And suddenly, on the cold, dark, raining porch, I realize that I actually feel him, -him-, against me. He’s hard. His cock, it’s pressing against my belly, I feel it, it’s like a rock against me, and I am flushed all of a sudden, I am rushed with desire, my body throbs once, twice, three times, and I feel my nipples harden underneath my bra.

I don’t let him go.

I feel like I’m standing in a hurricane, but pretending that the wind isn’t blowing.

My face is pressed to his chest, I can feel him breathing, I can actually feel his heart beating, it’s pounding, and I know mine is pounding too, and I just hold him, tighter, tighter, running my fingers up and down his spine, in that fucking amazing delightful vertical crease in the center of his back, my fingers just sliding up and down there, and I am filled with lust and longing and desire, my body hot with it, and he’s still holding me, he’s not pulling away, and I can still feel how hard he is against me.

I pull back. I hold his face in my hands, and I look at him in the eyes. I am just doing this, not thinking, not planning. I hold his face, meeting his gaze finally, and his eyes are full of pain and lust and desire and loneliness, and I don’t care why he’s here, all I care about is that he might stay tonight, he might stay with me tonight, and fulfill all I have dreamed about with him, since that night in the tent.

I pull his face to mine and I give him a single, chaste, gentle kiss, on his mouth. And then step back, letting him go, and watch. I want to see what happens. I want him to pull me to him, I want him to crush my body to his, to lose control, and take me.

He stands there, still wet, still dripping, his eyes, oh fuck, oh god, his eyes.

I watch him, as he makes the decision.

I am just seeing it happen. He decides. I know he’s thinking, in this moment, of Ron, and how he shouldn’t do this, how much he loves Ron and how much he values the beautiful marriage that Ron and I have, our happiness, our happy marriage, and I watch him, as he decides, and he decides it, that he doesn’t care. I can almost see it happen, him deciding that he wants me, he wants me more than he cares about Ron, wants me more than he cares about my marriage, wants me, just me, he wants me.

I let it happen.

He rushes forward, in force, and then, he lifts me up, crushing his mouth into mine. His tongue pushing into my mouth, his arms around me, my feet off the ground, he has actually picked me up, and he’s kissing me with all the force of all the years of sexual tension, the countless years of connectedness and friendship and barely-contained desperate fucking lust, all of that, and he’s kissing me, it is our very first real kiss, and it’s everything I ever imagined. I open my mouth to him, pushing my tongue along his, and wrap my arms around his body again. He’s so hot, so hot against me. The wet clothes barely matter. I can feel him, on me, against me, alongside me. And I know, in this moment, I will soon feel him inside me, and that realization collapses into my mind, and I am surging with arousal, feeling the blood pool and pulse down below, the pulse, the throb, the ache, I need something to fill that up. I feel so deep, so raw, so connected, I want to push into him harder, I am aching for release, I am aching to feel him inside me. I know he wants to be explored, I know I want to be exposed.

I will give this to him. 

And, I will take this, for me.

I deserve this, I deserve to be happy. This is what I want. If he gives it to me, which clearly, he will, then it hurts no one. And if it hurts no one, to feel him inside me, just this one time, and then we will go back to the way it was, and if it hurts no one, then why shouldn’t I have what I want? Why shouldn’t I? Why fucking not? I deserve this, I want it, I need it. I need it! I just want to feel him inside me, just once, just once. Is that so wrong? It’s not wrong, I am convincing myself, as his mouth moves over mine, as his tongue slides on mine, I deserve this, I am imagining Harry, all this time, him, dreaming of me, wanting me, the way that I have dreamed of him, the way I have wanted him.

I decide, here, tonight, now. I decide. 

I will let it happen. It feels good, it feels so damn good, his skin so soft, so warm, my hands against his back and his skin through the thin material there, it’s like I am already touching him without the cloth, it’s like I am already naked with him. I feel my thoughts getting tangled, like a rat’s nest of hair, the way my hair gets after sex, after I get fucked for an hour, the raw tangle of that, just messed, and heavy, and I can’t get purchase here, I can’t find a place to hold on to, it’s that feeling, I want him, not to touch me with clothes, but to touch me without them, to be inside me, oh god, inside me, alongside my body.

I still kiss him, but I pull back for a moment, he sets me down on the porch again. He still doesn’t talk. He says nothing. But I can see, in his eyes, I can see right into the center of him, I can see right down deep into the need he has, the longing, the thundering clash of desire. And I know, as he’s looking into my eyes, that he can see mine, as well.

I take his hand. I pull him into the house. He comes with me, and shuts the door behind us.

And then he is lifting me, scooping me up into his arms, like I am a child, and I know he’s not a large man, and I am not a tiny woman, but despite that, he gathers me into his arms and I am surprised and feel like I am collapsing into something, I am giving in, right now, I am just letting it happen. He scoops me up, and he looks at me in the eyes, and I wrap my hands into his hair, and look right at him in the eyes, and I just nod. I don’t say a word, and neither does he. We just look at each other. And I nod, and he nods, and in total silence, he carries me, he walks into the guest room (I know it’s because he can’t stand to do this in my bedroom, in the bed that Ron and I have been together so many countless times, but I don’t care, and I actually agree, the guest room, it has to be the guest room).

He lays me down on the bed in the darkness. He shuts the door behind him, he’s standing there in front of the door, and I am lying there on the bed. I just look at him. I don’t know what else I can do. Truly, I am lost.

I am lost.

He peels off his wet shirt as he walks toward me. I scoot back on the bed, watching, and his chest is only covered with an undershirt now, he can’t stop looking at me, and I realize I am breathing so fast, so hard, my heart is beating like it will smash out of my chest, and I just watch, as he comes for me.

He climbs onto the bed. He grabs my legs and pulls them toward him, sliding me onto my back. He slides his hands over my legs, over and over, desperate, hard, and soft, all at once. He looks at me. I nod. He reaches up and pulls down my pants, so slowly, it’s like being trapped in hell, but it’s happening, and I guess in the end, I don’t really care how slow he is. But oh god, I want him to do this faster.

He pulls them down. He sits up on his knees, looking down at me, my panties, which are stupidly tiny and lacy, and he just looks at my body.

While watching his face, I slowly, deliberately, carefully, hook my thumbs into the sides of my underwear, and I start to slide them off. I watch his eyes, and I slide them totally off, and his eyes, oh god, it’s like they are aching, it is agony, it is joy, it is beauty. 

Now I’m naked below the waist. He’s kneeling on the bed before me. He hasn’t spoken a word. He’s just looking, and I can feel his lust, radiating.

All at once, he leans forward, wraps his arms around me, pulls me toward him. He pulls my legs around his body. He looks at me right in the eyes, as he lowers his face, lowers his mouth toward my sex. He watches me, hooded eyes, as he gently touches his lips to me, then more forcefully, then even more firmly, his lips kissing my clit, his hands suddenly spreading me apart, his fingers sliding along me, his lips, and then, he’s still watching my face, and he starts to slide his tongue against my clit, gently at first, just rhythmic and slow, and gentle, and he’s still watching me, as I arch my back and gasp, I am losing my mind, I am losing it, he’s holding my hips firmly, just licking and licking, it’s so slow and firm that I know that I will come soon, but I am trying to clamp it down, trying to hold it off, because I dread that if I come, he will stand up and walk away, just like he did that night in the tent, after I come, he will stand up and leave me, but oh god, his tongue on my clit, lapping, slick, sliding, without cease, without pause, and I feel it building inside me. I try to toss my hips and shake him off, but he holds me even tighter, and he’s still looking at me right in the eyes, as all of this is happening, and I clench and squeeze and tighten, and then suddenly I feel two of his fingers slide inside me, even while he’s still holding my hips, even while he’s still licking my clit, so slowly, and I am coming, I am lost in the orgasm, it washes past me like a wave, oh god, I am coming, and I lean my head back and I am flooded now, my mouth is open, I know I am calling out, I am gasping, I am shaking, I am writhing, and I know he can feel my body pulse, my sex, pulsing against his lips and throbbing against his hand and his tongue.

The wave crashing, crashing.

And then… Then, it’s over, and I am trembling, I sit up on my elbows, he’s still holding my hips, still poised between my open legs, and he is just looking at me. And my heart is jumping, dancing, aching in my chest.

I reach for him.

He comes to me, lies overtop me, his body’s full weight crushing me into the bed, I wrap my hands into his hair, and then his mouth (and he tastes sweet and sour and salty, he tastes like my sex), his mouth wraps over mine, and we are kissing again, we are kissing and I feel him hard against me again, and then my legs are wrapped around his waist, ankles crossed over his back, and his cock is so hard that I can feel it through his pants and crushing into my body, I am barely able to breathe because his full weight is on me right now, and I am short of breath and my lungs won’t expand, because his body just on mine, fully on mine, and the kissing is so raw, so real, it’s like nothing I have ever experienced, it’s like nothing I have even fucking imagined, it’s him, pushing into me, and me, letting him.

I am letting him.

I pull him into me, I am kissing him, and then I push him back slightly, and I reach for his undershirt and I lift the hem, watching his eyes, and then he takes the hem from me and pulls his shirt over his head, baring his chest. And he kisses me again, just once, gentle, sweet. And he’s straddling me. And I sit up, wriggling out of his grasp, and I pull my own shirt off, and then lean forward, reaching behind my back and unhook my bra and toss it aside. Now I’m naked. He’s still wearing pants, but he hasn’t stopped staring at me, staring at my body, his eyes raking up and down, his hands up in front of him, trembling, hesitant. And I look at him, and I don’t say anything, but I reach for his belt and I unbuckle it. I pull the leather out of the loops, slowly, so slowly. His body is trembling underneath my fingers. His skin is so soft, along the waist. The skin of his arms prick up into goosebumps as I’m unbuttoning the jeans button, and then sliding the zipper down, so slowly, so deliberately. I feel him hard in my hands as I push his pants down. He moves a little, just a little, so I can push the pants totally off of him. He’s naked now, and I’ve never seen him naked before, and I can see his cock, solid and hard and I just ache for it, I can’t stand it. 

I curl up onto my knees again, I reach for him, and I pull him close. I kiss him on the mouth, on the shoulders, on the chest, my hands gently rubbing all along his skin, my fingers softly gliding along him. I pull him down next to me on the bed. I nestle my head into his shoulder there, he’s on his back, and I am lying on my side, my leg thrown over his legs, my arm over his chest, and my hand on his stomach. I feel his stomach muscles clench and tense, as I slide my hand down. I push down through his pubic hair, and then his cock is in my hand, and at first I just want to touch it so softly, I just slide my fingertips up and down the shaft, around the tip, along the head, and feel the wetness of his arousal there, and then his hips are bucking up into me, and I feel him holding me with his arms, his hand on my arm, and I realize he is asking me for something more. So I let it happen.

I sit up slightly, and glide down his body, getting closer to his cock. One tender kiss there, on the tip, and then I take him into my mouth, all the way, one fluid motion, deeply, and feel him against the back of my throat, and I hear him, he’s gasping, he’s moaning, he’s saying my name, just quietly, but saying my name, over and over. I use my hands and my mouth and I taste him, all along the length, the salt of him, the slickness, his soft and smooth against my lips, and I am rhythmic about it, but not too rhythmic, because if he comes before he’s inside of me, if he dares to come now, I will die, I will just die.

I suck him, I am stroking him, and he’s got his hands in my hair, he’s pushing me, but then suddenly, he pulls his hands away, like he’s afraid to force me, or to make me go further. And his hands out of my hair, it’s like an aching absence, I need him to touch me, to make me do it, and to push me down on him, so I grab his hands and push them back into my hair, saying, in between long, slow sucking movements, I say to him, “make me, make me do this,” and I hear him moan, and then he grasps my head with his hands and pushes me down onto his dick, and I swallow all of it, to the root, and my sex is pulsing again with fucking lust, he is taking me, he is using me, and I love it, I love it.

I can feel him now, I can tell he is close, and I will not let this end like this. I won’t. So I pull my mouth away from him, I sit up, and I look at him in the eyes, and I don’t say anything, I just watch him, gently still caressing his cock with my hands, and then, I just sit and wait.

He watches me stroking him for a moment, and then his eyes grow dark again, hooded, the glare, and he rolls, pushing me back down on the bed, on my back, and he’s sliding his hands over my breasts, pinching my nipples, then pinching them harder, even harder, as I rock against him, eyes rolled back, my heart pounding, my body alive, my sex throbbing, I am so wet and slick, and he’s licking my nipples while also putting his hands on me, inside me, his fingers sliding deep inside me, his thumb rolling around my clit, and then I am begging, I am talking aloud, I am asking, “please, please, oh god please I need it, please please,” and he is smiling a little, as he whispers a contraception charm, and then I am grabbing him by the hips and he is guiding his cock down, and then, oh then, he’s inside me, and I pull him in by the hips, I pull him down onto me, so that he is all at once, deep inside me, all the way, to the root, our bodies joined completely, and my body betrays me, I orgasm all at once, an explosion that takes me totally by surprise, he’s nestled deep within me, finally, at last, oh, and my body rocks, and shakes, and I feel my sex pulsing with my orgasm, oh, so suddenly, and I’m dying, maybe, dying, maybe. And I twist beneath him, but he holds me still, and he has his hands around my arms, as he lies on top of me, deep within me, as my orgasm rushes through me, and I know he can tell that I am coming, and I see it in his eyes, that he is barely keeping it together, that he is close to coming too. But he holds it back, and he kisses my lips, sweetly, and waits. And when it’s over, when my body stops the tremor, stops shaking, when I’m still – that’s when he starts to move. Thrusting, deep inside me, his body still hard on mine, his weight crushing the breath out of me, sliding in and out of me, just sliding there, and I am rushed with ecstasy, bliss, and his eyes never stop looking into mine, he just watches my face, he has his hands on my breasts, and on my hair, and on my face, and his fingers on my lips, and then in my mouth, and my hands are rushing up and down his back and my fingernails are scratching a pattern on his shoulders, and I am gasping, I am calling his name, over and over, calling his name into the still night, “Harry.” And he kisses my neck, my shoulders, my breasts, and he still rocks into me, over and over, and it is the best and most wonderful and most devastating thing that has ever happened to me, to us. I can feel him getting close, his thrusting grows more frantic, his cock feels so hard inside me, and I am close too, I watch his face, and I feel his shoulders, as his orgasm comes upon him, the goosebumps breaking out all along his chest and his shoulders and he finally gasps my name, my name, he’s looking at me in the eyes, and he’s saying my name, as he comes, he’s coming inside me, inside me, the way I have wanted, the way I have always dreamed. His hands clutch my arms so tightly that I know I will have bruises tomorrow, and that sudden realization, along with the pulse of him inside me as he comes, it brings me right to the brink again, and then he takes one hand and slides it between us, pushing hard on my clit, just a firm pressing there, and I am coming again, I am feeling my body shake and quiver, and I throw my hips against him, and as he’s inside me, coming, I am coming too, and this is the best thing, the best, the best thing.

He collapses onto me. I can’t breathe, but I like that. I have always liked that feeling, being crushed, the sense of the weight of a man on top of me. And this is the man that I wanted. 

He kisses me as he slides out of me. I roll to the side, he lies back down on his back, and I curl into his shoulder, my head in the crook of his arm, my hand on his chest, my leg thrown over him, and we just lay there, breathing, trying to catch our breath.

After a while, I pull the blanket up over us both, and we curl together underneath it, feeling our bodies cool. He still hasn’t really spoken since he arrived, and I don’t know what to say anyway, so we just lay there in silence, together, our bodies together, alongside him, I am alongside him, and he has been inside me, and it is done now, and I am so happy, so dreadfully happy, so ghastly joyous, and I both love it and hate it, but at this moment, I don’t care, I don’t care, I just want to feel this forever, feel him alongside me, feel his skin with mine.

And we lay together for a long, long time. Hours. We don’t talk, but he touches me, sliding his hands on my body, and I touch him, my fingertips dancing over his arms, his chest, his skin. My head nestled into his shoulder, one of his hands on my hipbone, and the other hand rushing quietly over my skin, all over my skin. And it’s so beautiful.

With time, I doze. And he does too.

And I only wake up because he’s slid out from underneath my body, he stands in the night and puts his clothes on again, but his eyes can’t stop looking at me, and I sit up in the bed, pulling the blanket over my nude form, and I watch him get ready to go.

I do need him to go.

He has to go. I know it. He knows it.

I watch him, as he dresses, and then he comes to me again and gives me a sweet, tentative kiss, his tongue just barely swiping mine, his hands in my hair again, his hands on my neck. And he smiles a tiny smile, and he pulls away, and he says, the only thing he’s really said to me since he got here:

“I love you, you know that.”

I just nod my head. I can’t speak, or I will start to cry.

So, I nod. And I wrap the blanket around me, and follow him back out of the guest room, into the living room. He stands before the front door, and turns back to me, and says, “Hermione. The night in the tent. I had to go. … Because. Ron.”

And I just whisper, “I know.”

And he looks both happy and devastated in the same moment, as he kisses me again, and he hugs me, and I feel his body on mine, and I know this dismay, and I see it, and I feel it, and I love it, because it’s mine. It’s my moment, forever, now. And it will be my moment.

He kisses me, and then he turns, and doesn’t say anything else, and he just opens the door and walks out, and closes the door behind him.

He doesn’t lead me out of the door, he doesn’t take me with him, but oh, how I know that he would have, if he could have. And I would have gone with him, and that’s why he didn’t ask me to come with him, because of Ron, because we both love Ron, and this night will have to be the only thing that Harry and I ever have, because of Ron. So, Harry doesn’t ask me to come with him, and so I get to stay here, in my good life, my good, happy life, and I am grateful to him, for that.

But despite all of that, as the door closes, and once he leaves, I fall to my knees in front of the door and press my forehead to the wall. I feel the tears welling up, and I ache. I am filled with joy, but also, a sinking sadness, that I realize will never leave me, not after tonight. The past, it’s never dead. It’s not even past. 

And then I stand up, wipe my eyes, and I walk to my room, to go to bed. Because, that’s what you do, when you survive, when you are alive, when you are fucking alive.

And I am alive. 

I am alive.

 

\----  
End.


End file.
